Formulation and validation of a regional household wealth index for sub-Saharan Africa.

ABSTRACT: A new era in global health assistance requires a focus on efficiently using limited and declining donor funds. This shift requires better evaluation methods to allocate resources effectively. Most evaluations in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) examine health disparities within countries, but it is also crucial to assess health outcomes at an inter-country level based on national wealth. Cross-country studies support resource reallocation to the neediest nations and help transition programs like HIV responses within countries with better health infrastructure. This paper presents an unsupervised machine learning method, Principal Component Analysis (PCA), applied to household surveys from 15 African countries to create a universal wealth index that allows multiple countries to be c

SUBMITTER: Razavi M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12578161 | biostudies-literature | 2025

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature